“How do you pick up the threads of an old life? How do you go on, when in your heart, you begin to understand, there is no going back? There are some things that time cannot mend. Some hurts that go too deep...that have taken hold.” J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King

i am reminded of someone who told me once that his mother cries during the opening scene of LOTR (lord of the rings) every time. which surprised me because that opening scene is pretty dang all sweetness and light. food and fun with frodo and friends enjoying their little hobbit lives unawares of the dangerous adventure that is about to find them...

and that was precisely why that mother cried. because it is the last time frodo and his friend will ever be unaware... untouched... unaffected... undone... by peril. they never again will be so light. and free. and happy.

oh yes, they will know great victories. oh yes, they will have new friends. oh yes, they will have seen much of the world. traveled over and under the ground. touched darkness and light. met a great wizard. a terrible dragon. an icky spider. elves. trolls. rings. oh my. but never again all sweetness and light.

there will be no going back to how it was before...

i think about that mother a lot. about how she cried for what frodo was about to lose. because i think i understand her...

i sat with a friend. another mother. in a coffee shop over the Christmas season. and we talked about our journeys through this mountainous territory of motherhood. the highs. the lows. the burdens. the invisibility. we talked about the dragons we have met. the ones that have seared our flesh and hearts with painful fire. we talked about those who have helped carry our burdens. about the multiple times we have heard the hoofbeats of the enemy as he pursued us in the night. we talked about how we long to go back to the days when it was all sweetness and light. dinner and second dinner.

there is a joy in adventure. for sure. but there is also a sadness. a burden. an exhaustion. and the reality that it goes on and on. and that we are changed by the knowing. changed in a way that means we will never be the same.

most days for me it is all about keeping the darkness at bay. in small ways. maybe that is why my word of the year for 2014 is LIGHT. because i so desperately need some. maybe that is why my friend and i spend a lot of time chatting in coffee shops. we need caffeine. and we need light. and it helps to sit with your tiny little spark and see if someone else's tiny little spark will help you light up a square inch of the darkness.

i pray that the shadow is only a small and passing thing. i pray this for all mothers in the dark. for my friend. for myself, as we have been each other's samwise gamgee too many times to count in the past few years...

because like samwise we need to remind each other that our stories really matter.

“It's like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were. And sometimes you didn't want to know the end… because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end, it’s only a passing thing… this shadow. Even darkness must pass.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Two Towers

we also need to remind each other that the story isn't over yet...

“There, peeping among the cloud-wrack above a dark tower high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King

and we call each other the brave one...

and we wouldn't have gotten this far without each other.

Sam: I wonder if we'll ever be put into songs or tales.

Frodo: [turns around] What? Sam: I wonder if people will ever say, 'Let's hear about Frodo and the Ring.' And they'll say 'Yes, that's one of my favorite stories. Frodo was really courageous, wasn't he, Dad?' 'Yes, my boy, the most famousest of hobbits. And that's saying a lot.'

Frodo: [continue walking] You've left out one of the chief characters - Samwise the Brave. I want to hear more about Sam. [stops and turns to Sam]

Frodo: Frodo wouldn't have got far without Sam.

Sam: Now Mr. Frodo, you shouldn't make fun; I was being serious.

Frodo: So was I. [they continue to walk]

Sam: Samwise the Brave...

― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Two Towers

a gardening magazine asked readers to name their favorite gardener. i loved this one response...

“Samwise Gamgee, from The Lord of the Rings. It was Sam who carried Frodo when he couldn’t go on. Wizards and warriors aside, in the end, Middle Earth was saved by a gardener.”

perhaps our own middle earth will be saved by two friends in a coffee shop. carrying the ring for each other when it gets too heavy. carrying each other when we can't keep walking...

and we journey on. being a parent is a dangerous business. you never know where you will be swept off to next. read all the books you want to. make all the schedules. goals. plans. outcomes. wishes. wants. must haves. check off all the lists. laminate everything in sight. but beyond all that...

there is a journey waiting out there. an adventure... there are mountains. there are dragons. there is mordor to contend with. there is a sadness that you never knew before you had children. there is an ease and rhythm to life that you will never find again.

“And yet their wills did not yield, and they struggled on.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King

“The world is indeed full of peril, and in it there are many dark places; but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, it grows perhaps the greater.”

― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Two Towers

love mingled with grief, grows perhaps the greater...

every year (since 2006. which was when i went back to a mac platform computer wise) i have been making photo slideshows to wrap up our year. i enjoy making them. i love choosing the songs. and seeing it all spin by in 10 minutes. well, all our good moments at least. glad the bad ones aren't captured by cameras. or remembered by a Savior who sends them as far as the east is from the west...

somehow i think heaven will be a HUGELY VASTER and much GREATER and more AWESOME thing than these slideshows but in one way they will be alike... it will be a time where we see the spinning of our few brief moments here as telling a story that we didn't see at the time. when ordinary moments are all extraordinary. when everything sad has come untrue and we see the joy that we there all along. PLUS there will be a kickin' soundtrack. good music in the background makes everything better.

if you want to see MORE of our yearly slideshows, click on the "etc..." button at the top of this page (right hand side) and then on that page find the "slideshows of awesomeness" button. click it and you will see all my babies grow up in 10 minute increments. enjoy.

witting.lea

“Anxiety is the result of a collapsing false god.” tim keller